An Inventory of Department of Corrections Administrative
Correspondence and Subject Files at the Texas State Archives,
1961-1962,
1967-1969, 1974-1976

The Texas Department
of Corrections (now the Texas Department of Criminal Justice) manages offenders
in state prisons, state jails and contracted private correctional facilities.
The agency also provides funding and certain oversight of community supervision
and is responsible for the supervision of offenders released from prison on
parole or mandatory supervision. These are administrative correspondence and
subject files from the executive director's office, dating 1961-1962,
1967-1969, 1974-1976. The earlier files primarily cover the period when Dr.
George Beto served as director, from 1962 to 1972; the 1974-1976 files are from
the term of W.J. Estelle, Jr. Materials found within these files include
incoming and outgoing correspondence, memoranda, acknowledgements, invitations,
directives to farm or program managers, clippings, graduation materials for
inmates receiving their GED (announcements, programs, speaking invitations,
etc.), and a self-study report on the Windham School District. The most
extensively covered topics in these records include agriculture production and
education. Other issues covered to a lesser degree, mainly in the miscellaneous
correspondence files, include alcoholic counseling, building a prison in West
Texas, complaints about conditions, victim compensation, prisoner exchanges
with Mexico, the prison rodeo, and choosing a new director for the prison in
1962.

The Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) manages offenders in
state prisons, state jails and contracted private correctional facilities. The
agency also provides funding and certain oversight of community supervision and
is responsible for the supervision of offenders released from prison on parole
or mandatory supervision. The Department of Criminal Justice came into being in
1848 when "An Act to Establish a State
Penitentiary" was passed by the Second Texas Legislature. The act
established a governing body of the penitentiary as a three-member Board of
Directors, appointed by the Governor, with the approval of the Senate. The
Board was responsible for creating and distributing a set of rules and bylaws
for the administration of the penitentiary, overseeing the treatment of
convicts, preparing an annual inventory of property, and making an annual
report to the Governor. Over the years, the name and composition of the Board
changed. While its basic functions were not greatly altered, some duties were
added. These included acquiring land for the Huntsville and Rusk facilities,
purchasing machinery, effecting repairs, leasing the penitentiaries, leasing
convicts for outside labor, purchasing and/or leasing farms for the employment
of convicts, and providing for the transfer of convicts from county jails to
the penitentiary. During the 19th century the direct management of the prison
was through the inspector, later known as the superintendent. Other officers
included assistant superintendents, inspectors of outside camps, the financial
agent, and physicians. The superintendent and financial agent had the most
direct dealings with the Board and the Governor in the management of the prison
system.

The Texas prison system began as a single institution, located in
Huntsville, known as the Huntsville Penitentiary. Convicts were put to work in
various shops and factories housed within the institution. In 1871, the
legislature directed that the penitentiary be leased to private individuals
(Chapter 21, 12th Legislature, 1st Called Session). These men, known as
lessees, paid the state for the convict labor and use of facilities, and in
turn, managed the system, including clothing and feeding the convicts and
paying the guards. It was during this period that the outside camp system was
firmly established as part of the prison system. In addition to the use of
convicts in and around the prison, the convicts were hired out to large labor
employers, mainly plantation owners and railroad companies. A second prison
facility, Rusk Penitentiary, was built between 1877 and 1882. It began
receiving convicts in January of 1883.

In 1881, the Legislature reorganized the prison system, abolishing the
Board of Directors, and creating in its place a Penitentiary Board, consisting
of the governor, the state treasurer, and the prison superintendent (Chapter
49, 17th Legislature, Regular Session). In April 1883, the administrative
system was again reorganized, with the board comprised of the governor and two
commissioners appointed by the governor (Chapter 114, 18th Legislature, Regular
Session). In 1885, the board composition changed once more, now consisting of
three commissioners appointed by the governor (House Bill 562, 19th
Legislature, Regular Session). This board was succeeded by the Board of Prison
Commissioners in 1910, which was composed of three commissioners appointed by
the governor (Senate Bill 10, 31st Legislature, 4th Called Session). The
legislation that created the new board also directed the prison system to begin
operating again on state account, i.e., lessees no longer managed the prison
system, effective in January 1911. Convicts, or inmates, were housed and worked
in one of the two prisons or on one of several state prison farms. The shop
industries slowed down while the prison farms expanded. This arrangement made
it more difficult to provide education and other reform measures. Such measures
were generally practiced at Huntsville, with some teaching extended to a couple
of prison farms by the early 1900s.

The Texas Prison Board replaced the Board of Prison Commissioners as
the governing body for the Texas Prison System in 1927, increasing in size to
nine members (House Bill 59, 40th Legislature, Regular Session). The members of
the board were appointed by the governor, with senate approval, to six year
overlapping terms. The Board formulated the policies and the manager carried
them out. During the Board's tenure, 1927-1957, the Board made changes in the
system including more emphasis on prison reform, teaching,
recreation--including the establishment of the Texas Prison Rodeo--and a new
method of classifying inmates. The Texas Prison System became the Department of
Corrections in 1957 (Senate Bill 42, 55th Legislature, Regular Session). This
Department was governed by the Board of Corrections, composed of nine members
appointed by the governor with the advice and consent of the senate to six year
overlapping terms.

In 1989, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ) and the Board
of Criminal Justice were created (House Bill 2335, 71st Legislature, Regular
Session). The Board is composed of nine members appointed by the governor with
the advice and consent of the senate to six year overlapping terms. The
governor may not appoint more than two members who reside in an area
encompassed by the same administrative judicial region. This new agency
absorbed the functions of three agencies: the Department of Corrections, the
Board of Pardons and Paroles, and the Texas Adult Probation Commission. The
Department of Corrections, which was responsible for the operation of the
prison system, is now the Institutional Division of the Department of Criminal
Justice. This Division still manages the housing of inmates within the prison
system. As of June 2007, approximately 151,960 offenders were housed in TDCJ
units or state jails and 13,195 in private facilities.

The TDCJ is composed of the following divisions: Administrative Review
and Risk Management, General Counsel, Community Justice Assistance,
Correctional Institutions, Private Facility Contract Monitoring/Oversight,
Parole, Rehabilitation and Reentry Programs, Health Services, Victim Services,
Human Resources and the Texas Correctional Office on Offenders with Medical or
Mental Impairments. The departments within the Business and Finance Division
report directly to the Chief Financial Officer. Additionally, the Chief
Financial Officer provides oversight for the Manufacturing and Logistics
Division, the Information Technology Division and the Facilities Division. The
State Counsel for Offenders Division, Internal Audit Division, the Office of
the Inspector General and the Windham School District report directly to the
TBCJ. Direct management of the prison system is through an executive director,
with each division headed by a director and each individual prison unit managed
by a warden.

The prison system has changed since the 1900s. A major penal reform
program was initiated in 1947, modernizing agricultural production, initiating
industrial production by inmates, and providing improvements in physical
facilities for inmates and employees. A Construction Division was created in
1948 to make use of inmate labor, prison-made brick, and concrete for new
building projects. In 1963, the Prison-Made Goods Act authorized an Industries
Program to produce materials for internal use and for sale to qualified
agencies in the state while providing occupational skills training to inmates.
Other services available to inmates include education, recreation, religion,
and physiological and psychological health care. The Windham School District
was created in 1969 to offer GED certificates or high school diplomas to
inmates. Junior college and senior college classes are available.
Rehabilitation programs offer vocational training, work furlough programs, and
community services to aid inmates in securing work upon release and making the
adjustment and transition into society. Legal services are also available to
inmates through the Office of the General Counsel.

In 1978, a class action suit was filed by inmate David Ruiz and others
on behalf of the inmates confined in the various institutions operated by the
Texas Department of Corrections against the director W.J. Estelle, Jr. and the
Texas Department of Corrections. The courts found the conditions of confinement
violated the United States Constitution and appointed a special master and
monitors to supervise implementation of the court-ordered changes. These
changes have included reduction of crowding in the prisons and the development
of better living, health, and working conditions for inmates. Federal oversight
of the Texas prison system ended in 2002.

(Sources include: Guide to Texas State
Agencies, various editions, the website of the agency (
http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/index.htm),
viewed on May 11, 2009, and the agency's records.)

The Texas Department of Corrections (now the Texas Department of
Criminal Justice) manages offenders in state prisons, state jails and
contracted private correctional facilities. The agency also provides funding
and certain oversight of community supervision and is responsible for the
supervision of offenders released from prison on parole or mandatory
supervision. These are administrative correspondence and subject files from the
executive director's office, dating 1961-1962, 1967-1969, 1974-1976. The
earlier files primarily cover the period when Dr. George Beto served as
director, from 1962 to 1972; the 1974-1976 files are from the term of W.J.
Estelle, Jr. Materials found within these files include incoming and outgoing
correspondence, memoranda, acknowledgements, invitations, directives to farm or
program managers, clippings, graduation materials for inmates receiving their
GED (announcements, programs, speaking invitations, etc.), and a self-study
report on the Windham School District. The most extensively covered topics in
these records include agriculture production and education. Other issues
covered to a lesser degree, mainly in the miscellaneous correspondence files,
include alcoholic counseling, building a prison in West Texas, complaints about
conditions, victim compensation, prisoner exchanges with Mexico, the prison
rodeo, and choosing a new director for the prison in 1962. Correspondents
include the executive director, assistant directors, wardens, other state
agencies, local officials, universities, and the general public.

These records represent only a small part of the directors' files that
were briefly inspected by an archivist in 1995 on site in Huntsville. At that
time, there were an estimated 80 to 100 cubic feet of similar records from the
office, dating about 1960-1980s. When this series was reviewed again in 1997,
most of the records present in 1995 had been destroyed. The materials remaining
are clearly incomplete: one group of records dates from 1961 to 1962, 1967 to
1969 and covers A-F of the filing system, and the other group of two cubic feet
of loose materials contains mostly unfoldered materials from 1974 to 1976.

Four other administrative correspondence series can be found in the
overall Texas Department Criminal Justice finding aid (
Texas
Department of Criminal Justice records): Administrative correspondence, Board of Corrections;
Administrative correspondence, insanity of inmates; Administrative correspondence, Assistant Director for
Special Services; and Administrative files,
Deputy Director; containing records from the 1950s to the 1980s.
Another series, Administrative policy files,
contains directives and policies from the 1960s-1980s, similar to the
ones found in these records, but of a more administrative nature.

This series was removed from the overall TDJC finding aid due to the
electronic file size limitations imposed by the online finding aid web site
(TARO). If you are reading this electronically, click on the following link to
access the overall finding aid,
Texas
Department of Criminal Justice records. If you are reading this in
paper in the Archives search room, this finding aid is found in a separate
divider within the same binder.

Arrangement

Materials were grouped by years by State Archives staff. Within the
groups, filed were arranged alphabetically with items within the folders filed
in reverse chronological order, as received from the agency. When outgoing
letters are attached to incoming letters, they are filed by the date of the
outgoing letter.

Restrictions on Access

Materials do not circulate, but may be used in the State Archives
search room. Materials will be retrieved from and returned to storage areas by
staff members.

Restrictions on Use

Most records created by Texas state agencies are not copyrighted and
may be freely used in any way. State records also include materials received
by, not created by, state agencies. Copyright remains with the creator. The
researcher is responsible for complying with U.S. Copyright Law (Title 17
U.S.C.).

These records were appraised as archival by staff of the Texas State
Archives in August 1998. The appraisal report can be found in the search room
of the State Archives. The online version of the report for this series is
available at
http://www.tsl.state.tx.us/arc/appraisal/tdcj.html.